By Nadezhda Sorokina
Jan. 28, 2025
Great Britain is ready to open a major criminal case against Roman Abramovich. A journalistic investigation by the BBC and the Bureau of Journalistic Investigations revealed a tax evasion scheme that allowed the former owner of Chelsea to save millions of pounds sterling in VAT.
According to journalists, Abramovich leased his superyachts to fictitious clients through a company that actually belonged to him.
In the period from 2005 to 2012, Roman Abramovich rented his yachts from himself: a complex scheme helped to avoid paying VAT in Europe.
The tax was charged for everything needed to service the ships, but the owners were exempt from it if the ship was used for commercial purposes.
Already in 2012, the Cyprus authorities demanded that the fictitious landlord company pay €14 million of unpaid taxes, and the appeal was finally rejected only last year. Evidence of these machinations was discovered thanks to the leak of documents from the Cypriot company MeritServus.
Roman Abramovich owned five superyachts with a total value of about €1.2 billion: Eclipse, Luna, Pelorus, Ecstasea and Le Grand Bleu. The yachts were registered to five companies registered in the British Virgin Islands, and four more companies in the same jurisdiction acted as fictitious tenants. The Sara Cyprus trust became the beneficiary of all seven offshore companies.
The yachts were allegedly managed by the Cypriot company Blue Ocean Yacht Management, which disguised itself as an ordinary agency and even had an office in the center of Limassol, but its clients were only five companies - the legal entities for Abramovich's yachts. The beneficiary of Blue Ocean was the Neptune trust. Both Sara and Neptune had connections with Abramovich. "We have, in fact, 5 "clients" (4 BVO + RA)," according to published letters, in 2007, Blue Ocean Director Jonathan Holloway spoke about yacht tenants.
Source: https://kompromat1.online/articles/311918-romana_abramovicha_obvinjajut_v_icpoljzovanii_shem_s_superjjahtami_v_velikobritanii_dlja_uklonenija_ot_uplaty_nalogov
By Nadezhda Sorokina
Jan. 28, 2025
Great Britain is ready to open a major criminal case against Roman Abramovich. A journalistic investigation by the BBC and the Bureau of Journalistic Investigations revealed a tax evasion scheme that allowed the former owner of Chelsea to save millions of pounds sterling in VAT.
According to journalists, Abramovich leased his superyachts to fictitious clients through a company that actually belonged to him.
In the period from 2005 to 2012, Roman Abramovich rented his yachts from himself: a complex scheme helped to avoid paying VAT in Europe.
The tax was charged for everything needed to service the ships, but the owners were exempt from it if the ship was used for commercial purposes.
Already in 2012, the Cyprus authorities demanded that the fictitious landlord company pay €14 million of unpaid taxes, and the appeal was finally rejected only last year. Evidence of these machinations was discovered thanks to the leak of documents from the Cypriot company MeritServus.
Roman Abramovich owned five superyachts with a total value of about €1.2 billion: Eclipse, Luna, Pelorus, Ecstasea and Le Grand Bleu. The yachts were registered to five companies registered in the British Virgin Islands, and four more companies in the same jurisdiction acted as fictitious tenants. The Sara Cyprus trust became the beneficiary of all seven offshore companies.
The yachts were allegedly managed by the Cypriot company Blue Ocean Yacht Management, which disguised itself as an ordinary agency and even had an office in the center of Limassol, but its clients were only five companies - the legal entities for Abramovich's yachts. The beneficiary of Blue Ocean was the Neptune trust. Both Sara and Neptune had connections with Abramovich. "We have, in fact, 5 "clients" (4 BVO + RA)," according to published letters, in 2007, Blue Ocean Director Jonathan Holloway spoke about yacht tenants.
Source: https://kompromat1.online/articles/311918-romana_abramovicha_obvinjajut_v_icpoljzovanii_shem_s_superjjahtami_v_velikobritanii_dlja_uklonenija_ot_uplaty_nalogov
